Light meter

[waltesefalcon]

Howdy fellas, I've got a photography question for ya. I am thinking about picking up a cheap light meter. I don't have any experience with these, so I am wondering: is there a big difference between brands, are there any I should just avoid? Are they kinda like test lights, where they are all about the same and the $10 one from NAPA is about as good as the $100 Snap-On?

 

[Basil]

Following. I have never used an external light meter myself as all of my cameras have built in meters.

 

[GregW]

How are you thinking you are going to use it? There are two types. Incident and spot. Incident meters read how much light is hitting what you are shooting. So it you were taking a head-shot, you'd want to have the meter right by the person's face pointed at the main source of light to take a reading. Spot meters measure the amount of light that is reflected from the object of interest. These can be used close up or at distance.
Both types can read flash if you want to pay more.
I have both, but with digital cameras and instant viewing of what I shot, the meters haven't been out of the case for years.

 

[waltesefalcon]

Great question Greg. I believe that a spot meter is what I'm looking for, since virtually all of my photography is outdoors in natural light.

 

[Basil]

Great question Greg. I believe that a spot meter is what I'm looking for, since virtually all of my photography is outdoors in natural light.

What Camera do you have? Most newer cameras have built in light meters.

 

[waltesefalcon]

I have a Nikon D7500, it has a light meter built in. This is just so I can learn more about photography. I sometimes feel like I got into the hobby twenty or thirty years too late, because my camera can do everything itself. All I really have to do is point and shoot, I don't need to know the first thing about photography to get decent photos with this camera.

 

[DrEntropy]

Greg defined it. We could likely match our collections of hand-held meters. Mine live in storage, too.

With your camera, the built-in meter is likely as, or even more accurate, than a hand-held external one for anything you will likely encounter. It is "calibrated" for the camera's sensor. You can set it to read anything from the entire frame, to spot-reading a small area of it.

A better learning tool (and a LOT less dollars!) would be to get an 18% gray card and use that, in conjunction with the camera's meter to get a good reading. To get a fair understanding of what the different variables do, start with the camera in manual, card in the same lighting as the subject, aim the camera at the card (Doesn't even need to be in focus), dial the possible variables to get the "0" of the camera's meter in line, depending on whether you want DoF to be deep or shallow (by setting aperture first), and whether the subject is moving or not (using shutter to stop motion first). Better to set your ISO at something like 400 or 800 as a "constant" to start with and work inside that constraint... and even though your DSLR is capable of some really amazing things itself, there are still some limitations and compromises that revert back to basics.

 

[waltesefalcon]

Thanks Doc, this is what I needed. I run the shutter speed and aperture manually all the time, but have found that setting it to auto ISO yields better photos for me. I'd like to learn more about lighting to be able to set the ISO a little better on my own.